


Restoration

by Stormvoël (BushRat8)



Category: Pirates of the Caribbean (Movies)
Genre: Barbossa's Memories, Cora's Memories, Elizabeth's Memories, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Hurt/Comfort, Injury, Multi, Recovery, mental distress
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-26
Updated: 2018-06-11
Packaged: 2019-05-13 20:38:37
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 6
Words: 10,635
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14755919
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BushRat8/pseuds/Stormvo%C3%ABl
Summary: After her horrific rape in HANDS OFF!!, the innkeeper begins to physically mend.  Her mental healing takes longer, though, while Barbossa, haunted by demons of his own, fears that he might lose her.==>>  Mind the Rape/Non-Con warning.  If you're triggered by this subject or just don't want to read about it, please exit now.





	1. Shall Ye E'er Want Me Again?

**Author's Note:**

  * For [walkwithursus](https://archiveofourown.org/users/walkwithursus/gifts).



> If you haven't read HANDS OFF!! (and even if you have):
> 
> In addition to the innkeeper, two other rapes mentioned in passing in HO!! are recalled in flashback here; one in quite an unfortunate bit of detail. It was a common crime that was perpetrated upon both genders of all ages, with the victim usually assumed to have invited it. Especially in the case of women, the social sentiment of the era was that they should prefer death rather than submission, no matter what the circumstances. The innkeeper was beaten nearly unconscious before her assailant climbed on board, but public opprobrium would have still fallen on her. Good thing that Barbossa made every attempt to keep news of the event from spreading throughout the village. He warned the normally gossip-prone Cora to keep her mouth shut… which she did, but not because he was ordering her to.
> 
> It's a real testament to Barbossa's unspoken love and (albeit deeply-buried) compassion that, instead of regarding the innkeeper as ruined and of no further value, he sees her as in no way less than she was before. He understands that, through no fault of her own, the innkeeper has suffered insult and injury to both body and mind and that she needs all the care and support he can give. That care is frustrating for him much of the time, and often doesn't seem to be helping, but he doggedly continues to give it nonetheless.
> 
> Barbossa _can_ be unrepentantly cruel to women, shouting at them, threatening them, pushing and smacking them around, but it's generally out of a garden-variety bad temper or — as with Elizabeth Swann — out of desperation, anger, and embarrassment that she should have hoodwinked him as to her identity. However, the desire to sexually humiliate women to demonstrate power or for physical pleasure is not in his repertoire, and there's a good reason for that.
> 
> Suddenly closing the inn to business was not remarkable. It might be because of sickness, sometimes it was time for spring cleaning or repairs and cleanup after a storm, and sometimes the innkeeper was simply worked to exhaustion and needed a day or two to recuperate. It was either open most of the time, or it was closed for whatever reason, and no one thought anything about it.
> 
> "Counterpane" was the word in use at that time for a bedspread. "Not yet flowered" was a typical way to express that a girl hadn't reached menarche, and was therefore not yet a fertile woman. 
> 
> The complete words and translation to the Cornish lullaby the innkeeper asks Barbossa to sing to her ("Your mother's song") can be found in GETTING TO KNOW YOU.
> 
> The usual wandering tenses.

 

 

-oOo-  
  


 

  
  
It's been ten days now, and the first night that the innkeeper has managed to sleep more than a few minutes at a time.  Barbossa knew there would be nightmares, but not like this:  not with the flailing and thrashing and shrieking.  But why should he be so surprised?  he wonders.  What that pig of a man did to her would drive any woman insane.  
  
He wants so much to take the innkeeper into his arms and just hold her, stroke her hair, whisper comforting words against her temple, let her feel his warmth, but she's afraid to let him get near her.  Finally, he needs to say out loud what he's thinking:  "Dove, listen.  I know ye're still frightened an' ye're wounded inside, an' I'm not askin' for what I know ye cannot yet give.  But 'tis _me_ , darlin' — _me_ , an' not anyone else — an' I'd ne'er hurt ye.  Please look at me an' tell me ye know that."  
  
The innkeeper sniffles and takes his hands, though she doesn't move closer.  "Hector.  Hector, I'm so sorry…"  
  
"Nay, sweet.  Nay.  I been hearin' 'sorry' from ye for days, an' I'll have no more of it, for it weren't yer fault then, an' it bain't so now."  Barbossa lightly brushes his lips against the innkeeper's knuckles, wanting to nibble them, though he refrains.  "I don't want ye t' be sorry.  I just want ye t' let me take care of ye so's ye can rest an' come properly back t' yerself."  
  
She's badly bruised and scraped and cut, and Barbossa's heart still hurts for the glimpse he got of her injuries from that day, being especially furious at the damage done to the delicate pink pearl and its velvety hood that are so often the objects of his special, ardent attention.  "Will this help?"  he'd asked when, after Cora had bathed her, he gave her the big jar of the soothing herbal salve that she always used on his scars.  
  
She'd nodded silently, and he'd watched from across the room as she smeared it everywhere, on the surface cuts and up inside her, tightly closing her legs when she was done, before smoothing it over the bite marks and bruises on her breasts.  
  
She's applied it every day, sometimes two and three times, and a fourth if she's really in pain.  She's used so much that twice, Barbossa has sent Cora to the apothecary for more, admonishing her not to say why it's needed.  
  
"Dove,"  Barbossa now anxiously asks.  "Dove, are ye still bleedin' from inside?  Are yer wounds not yet knittin', at least a bit?"  
  
The innkeeper blushes;  not the rosy blush she gets when she's excited, but a hot purple flush of shame.  "I don't know."  But she _does_ know:  blood has been continuing to spot the linen cloths she's been tucking between her legs, and tinging her bathwater pink.  The new skin beginning to cover the abrasions on her thighs is still fragile, and some of her other cuts haven't yet closed.  The ones inside her _are_ starting to heal thanks to the salve, but the exterior lacerations are still terribly painful, and never more so then when she's drunk too much tea and has to relieve herself.  That's when she feels like she's being doused with saltwater, like a man pickled after a flogging has slashed his back to ribbons, and it takes every bit of her willpower not to scream.  
  
She will have no one but Cora to help her, and she always locks the door, because it would never do for Barbossa to find her in such an ungainly posture, crouching there over the chamber pot, sweating and shaking, her hands pressing the bloodied square of cloth down on herself so hard that she doesn't know how the exquisitely agonized little nub isn't squashed flat or somehow pushed back into her body, where it can never be seen or touched again.  
  
She doesn't know that, for Barbossa's part, he's more than once had the thought that, like a solicitous mother cat, he'd like to lick the offended flesh very gently, cleansing it, relieving the pain, breathing warmly to dry it, preparing it for an application of the sweet-smelling salve and a swath of protective linen bandage.  But instead of this thought making him smile, as it should, it makes him unhappy to know that the innkeeper is afraid to let him take a greater part in her recovery… and she will certainly not let him do _that_.  
  
She allows Barbossa to sleep in her bed because there's a feeling of safety and protection in his being there, but only if he doesn't try anything.  She lets him hug her, nuzzle her her cheek, and kiss her forehead before they get under the covers, but after that, he must content himself with holding her hand and calming her down when the night terrors come.  
  
Barbossa finds himself in the position of going against much that is in his nature:  instead of giving free rein to his libido, he chooses instead to forego the pleasure he could find if he'd only run down into town for a quick tumble.  Instead of seeking out a tavern with reasonably good food, endless drink, and jolly company — for the innkeeper is weak and quiet, still liable to be overcome by sickness, and not up to the work of cooking yet — he stays in and takes meals of toasted bread and cheese while he talks to her of calming, trivial things, and whispers that he's pleased just to be with her.  He doesn't even snipe and snarl at Cora, who has been a great help in caring for her mistress for a terrible reason that he does not and will never know.  
  
As he gazes upon the innkeeper and wipes her tears away, Barbossa knows he would take every one of her wounds upon himself if it meant she would nestle close in his arms again and look up at him without shame and fear in her eyes.  
  
The innkeeper spends the first several days in bed, afraid to emerge from her room, so Cora brings her tea and light meals ("No lemon water for you, Missus,"  she says at the very beginning.  "Lemon's sharp on th' way in, an' damn if it ain't gonna burn on th' way out, an' you don't need that."), helping her balance over the enameled pot whenever necessary, and sponging her body with cool cloths throughout the day so that she might feel clean.  "She's cryin' again, Cap'n,"  she reports, sighing.  "I don't know what else t' do t' make her feel better."  
  
"Ye're doin' what ye can, an' that's enough."  
  
Cora nods.  "Thankee, Cap'n."  
  
While she does her best to prepare food that will tempt the innkeeper into trying to eat at least a bit of something, it's no good;  anything the innkeeper eats sickens her and comes straight back up, and presently, she starts refusing any nourishment at all.  A few days of this, and Barbossa takes charge, saying flatly,  "Look here, Dove:  shame tastes awful an' ain't gonna keep you in health, an' it won't help no one if ye starve t' death owin' t' yer belly bein' so full of it that there bain't room for anythin' else.  So all right, m' girl:  no more meat or bread or such-like if it don't want t' stay down, but ye'll have good tea an' hot broth, an' I'll sit here an' feed ye ev'ry spoonful."  
  
The innkeeper cries and cries, but she acquiesces to Barbossa's order;  which, after all, is kindly meant.  A couple more days, and her stomach finally begins to settle enough to take a bit of bread with her soup.  
  
Nighttime is exhausting, and Barbossa gets little sleep, being wakened repeatedly to try and hush the innkeeper's screaming, knowing he's walking a fine line between wanting to rock her and hold her tightly, and knowing he mustn't;  not without the explicit permission that she just can't give him yet.  "Please don't cry, Dove,"  he tells her, his heart aching.  "'Tis only a dream;  'twill pass;  it can't hurt ye…"  
  
But it can.  He, of all people, knows how a terrible, gut-wrenching memory insinuating itself into his dreams can make a hell of his life if he can't outrun or at least bury it.  
  
As time passes — a week and then two — the innkeeper moves downstairs during the day, lying on the settee in her dressing gown, covered by a white cotton counterpane.  Barbossa watches her from a nearby chair in the beginning, then settles on the floor besides her, his head resting at her knees, and all is well for awhile until he inadvertently smiles and says,  "Ye're lookin' better, m' pretty girl."  
  
The innkeeper's body jerks so sharply that she knees him in the face.  "Don't!"  she quails.  "Don't call me that!  _He_ called me pretty…!"  Her breath is coming in short gasps, and she's getting dizzy.  "Please don't!"  
  
Outside of wondering if she's just broken his nose, Barbossa is cursing himself for his blunder, however unintentional it was.  "I didn't mean it, Dove!  Please, sweet, I didn't know…"  His hands are gripping the edge of the counterpane, trying to smooth it back into place without touching her more than he has to.  
  
_Had she told me ye called her 'Dove,' ye scurrilous fuck, I'd gather up all th' dead pieces of ye an' cut 'em into even smaller ones, an' I'd twist me sword up yer putrid arse for good measure!_  
  
He's wishing he'd done that anyway when the assailant was alive, but first, what Barbossa _really_ wishes is that he'd taken a large fistful of the stinging nettles that grow across the road and, with a splintery broom handle, stuffed them as far up the man's backside as they would go.  If anyone deserved torture of the most heinous sort, he did, but while Barbossa usually has the presence of mind to think of such things, it's a measure of the sick, paralyzing horror he'd felt that he didn't.  
  
Putting a hand to his face, Barbossa finds that, while his nose isn't broken, the innkeeper _has_ bloodied it.  "Cora!"  he hollers.  
  
She appears from the kitchen, where she's been baking bread;  an activity that makes the house smell good and, in turn, the homely scent comforts the innkeeper.  "Oh shite, Cap'n, what happened t' you?"  
  
"Yer Mistress had a fright an' I got in th' way."  He's not about to admit his part in it.  "Got a wet cloth?"  
  
Cora nods;  disappears;  comes back with the requested item and watches while Barbossa wipes the gouts of blood off his face.  
  
Under her counterpane, the innkeeper is crying softly, unaware that she's hurt him.  "Ye must talk about it,"  he says, his voice low and quiet.  "Though it sore pains ye t' remember, I think 'twill be worse t' hold it in.  Shall ye come upstairs an' talk t' me, then?  Mm?"  Barbossa nods Cora over.  "Bring me a basin upstairs, lest she be sickened, wet cloths so she may refresh herself, an' a tankard of cold water so she may rinse her mouth should she need it."  
  
"Yessir.  Right away."  Cora snuffles and wipes her nose on her apron, for these feelings the innkeeper has are ones she herself endured when her mother's beast of a lover decided to turn his filthy attentions to the daughter.  It was a long time ago when she was just taking her first steps out of childhood, but seeing the straits the innkeeper's in now brings back the stink of apocrine sweat and a crushing weight on her belly, and oh Jesus, the stabbing pain and that horrible feeling of being stretched by the fat bastard's prick as he rammed himself inside, laughing that her virgin cunny was so very tight and oh yes, oh _yes_ , he groaned, she was so much better than her mother and wouldn't she like it if he plied her with his attentions with regularity from then on?  
  
Thank Christ she hadn't yet flowered, so that his seed had scattered on fallow ground.    
  
Cora swallows hard and slams the door on the memory, wondering if she, too, will be beset by nightmares like the innkeeper if she can't keep it shut.  "If you need me, ye've only to yell an' I'll come right away."  
  
"Thankee, missy."  
  
Barbossa carries the innkeeper upstairs, tenderly, like a child, setting her down on the bed and tucking her in before he sits down beside her and takes her hand.  "All right,"  he begins.  "I've let ye be silent an' alone wi' yer misery, but now I bain't so sure it were e'er the wisest course.  I been watchin' th' thought of what were done t' ye fester inside, Dove, where ye can do nothin' t' stem th' tide in which ye're drownin'.  But now… I don't care if ye scream an' cry, or if it sickens ye t' heavin' yer guts out, or if ye want t' swear at me an' swing yer fists for makin' ye do it, but ye're gonna talk."  He ignores the tear that runs down the side of his nose.  "Ye hear me?"  
  
"Don't!"  
  
She sounds so frightened that Barbossa almost backs down, but he can't;  not when he senses that what he's asking of her is the only way to help.  "Talk t' me!"  he pleads.  "Bain't like I don't know what happened;  not when I saw it with me own eyes!  I heard ye cry out and I saw how ye tried t' fight, an' God help me, though I've hacked up more men than I can count an' gave not one fuck for their pain, when I saw all that blood as poured from yer wounds in that soft, sweet place, I were sick t' death.  So ye think I blame ye for it?  Any of it?  I don't.  I _don't!_   Dove, _look at me!"_        
  
Slowly, the innkeeper raises her eyes, black eyes to blue, and Barbossa watches a titanic struggle go on in them that he cannot help with until she chooses to speak.  _Talk t' me_ ,  he wills her.  _Tell me how sick an' disgusted ye are, how afraid ye're worthless in me eyes;  tell me all of it so's ye may be assured I understand th' first an' don't think t' other.  Tell me ev'rythin' so's yer heart may begin t' heal._         
  
She slips her fingers between Barbossa's;  the first really intimate gesture she's allowed since that horrible day.  "I can't,"  she whispers, so softly that he can barely hear her.  
  
But,  "Ye must."  
  
"I can't.  You don't understand..."  
  
_Oh, don't I?_   Barbossa thinks grimly, and he's not remembering finding her pinned under her assailant, but of himself, and the two officers who slapped him so hard that his head felt like it was spinning, then shoved him down on his knees with an order to open his mouth and service them.  They'd twisted his ears and pulled on his long auburn hair, snickering when he gagged;  but the worst came when they dragged him to his feet, one yanking his arms behind him to keep him still while the other unlaced and dropped his breeches, after which they took turns brutally violating him, their hands squeezing and stroking his masculine parts even as they used him like a woman.  _Whatsa matter, Barbossa?_   he still remembers the wet, panting voice in his ear, its owner's cock so far up his body that he was afraid he'd rip in two.  _You're limp as a China noodle, boy.  What, don't you like it?_      
  
It was excruciating and he could barely breathe for the way they'd pressed his face into the tabletop so his screams wouldn't be heard, but they still enjoyed hearing his muffled sobs, and guffawed when he cried that it hurt so much and begged them to stop:  little Hector, barely 13 years old and three months at sea.  He'd grown up quickly that harrowing night, learning what real degradation was… and that's when, even in the midst of the searing pain in his bloodied backside and his humiliation over what had been done, he'd felt his first clear-headed, white-hot adult rage, snarling to himself that, God-fucking-damn it, no one lays hands or cock or anything else on a Barbossa and they would good and goddamn well pay for it.  
  
He sincerely hoped the shards of smashed-up glass he put in their stew a week later tore their guts and their arseholes up as badly on the way out as their langers had torn his on the way in.  Too bad he couldn't brag about his first two cold-blooded murders, lest anyone find out why he'd done it.  
  
_Oh aye, Dove, I understand all too well._   Barbossa doesn't even realize how he's shuddering.  _As I saw ye retch out yer shame on th' ground, so I spewed up me own o'er th' rail 'til I thought m' stomach should come up an' be cast int' the sea;  an' with ev'ry heave, I felt th' hot blood spill down me legs from where I were wounded, just as I saw it run from yers._      
      
It's why, save for a single instance in his thoughtless youth, Barbossa doesn't count rape among the crimes he'll be called to account for on Judgement Day.  Even should his men wish to indulge, and though he'll turn a blind eye for the sake of their not turning into an irate, howling, mutinous mob, he requires that they take their sport well outside of his sight and hearing, for he wants no reminders of the savagery visited upon him as a boy.    
  
_Oh, aye,_   he thinks again, tightening his grip on the innkeeper's hand.  _More'n you'll e'er know, more'n I'll e'er tell you, I understand._  
   
"I know,"  Barbossa begins now,  "that ye don't feel able t' speak th' words of what th' bastard did, and that, I don't ask ye t' tell me.  But please, Dove… ye must tell me of what he's made ye _feel_ , that I may help you understand that I see ye now as I always have."  _For I could not stand it if ye should push me away an' ne'er want me again._  
  
The innkeeper sits up and presses her forehead to his shoulder while she cries.  "How can you bear to be near me?"  she sniffles.  "I'm so… I'm _dirty_ …"  
  
_An' how filthy I felt, too_ ,  Barbossa recalls with disgust.  "Nay, Dove.  Th' only one as were dirty's that pig what touched ye, but ye've been well-bathed of him, o'er an' o'er, by now" — he absently presses a kiss, then two to the side of her head — "but even if 'twere not so, ye'd still be as sweet as e'er ye were t' me.  You must ne'er fear that I'd cast ye aside or leave ye."  
  
That's what she's afraid of, he finds as the next hour wears on and she hesitantly speaks:  that he'll be repulsed by her;  that he'll condemn her for another making dirty what was always clean before.  _An' did I ask for two cocks t' be crammed down me throat an' up me arse?_   comes the blunt thought.  _Like bloody hell I did, an' neither did you ask for what were done._   "Nay,"  Barbossa says again.  "Only one were at fault, Dove, an' it weren't you…"  
  
He knew that making her speak would bring back his own dreadful memory, as clearly as if it had occurred only yesterday, and it's so hard to deal with it, but deal, he will.  If he would ask her to understand that she's not to blame for what happened, then he must take his own advice as he faces his own ghosts.  
  
Slowly, very slowly, the innkeeper starts to relax a bit;  a hot cup of tea Cora brings soothes her, and she even manages a bit of a smile at Barbossa once he's helped her to lie down.  "Sing to me,"  she asks after awhile.  "Please sing.  Sing me your mother's song."  
  
"Really?"  The request makes him grin, and he raises one heavy, unkempt eyebrow at her.  "Ye like that, do ye?"  
  
"Mm-hm."  
  
Barbossa takes both of the innkeepers hands between his own.  "Close yer eyes then, Dove, an' I'll sing ye t' sleep."  _An' may it be restful this night, for monsters bain't welcome here…_  
  
 He clears his throat, silently listening for the long-ago voice of his mother to give him his pitch, and begins.

 

_"Cysk, fleghyk, cysk,_

 

_"Ny wra Tasek dos,_

 

_"Tewlys yn mysk,_

 

_"Hungan nos......"_

 

  
  
-oOo-  TBC  -oOo-

 

 

 


	2. Leavetaking

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The demands of his ship and his men decree that Barbossa must finally depart whether he wants to or not.

 

 

-oOo-  


 

 

 

  
He's stayed with the innkeeper just as long as he can, and longer, but Barbossa is still captain of a ship, his men are beginning to grumble, and he's being obliged, finally, to go back to sea.    
  
There will be some changes made to the innkeeper's daily routine,  he admonishes her,  and she's not to argue or fight him on this.  "Ye'll go nowhere alone,"  he says, his fingertips stroking lightly over her forehead and tracing her eyebrows.  "Ye'll take Cora with ye, or a reg'lar lodger ye trust.  Bribe him if ye have to, or pay Cora extra if she fusses.  Whate'er ye must do, then do it, but ye're t' have a companion at all times."  
  
The innkeeper doesn't know if she feels foolish, perturbed, or just a bit angry.  "I'm not a child, Hector."  
  
"An' don't I know it,"  he replies solemnly.  "But ye're a lovely woman, an' I do not wish ye t' be alone.  Please, darlin'.  If ye do not promise me this, I'll be worried frantic, an' a distracted cap'n be a dead one."  
  
That said, the worried innkeeper agrees, but then she asks something that's guaranteed _not_ to help Barbossa's state of mind.  "Will you be coming back?"  
  
He stares at her, open-mouthed.  "What kind of question be that?"  he asks, unable to fathom why she should think that he wouldn't.  _Not 'when,' but 'if'…?_   Barbossa is trying not to show the upset her uncertainty causes him.  "Oh, Dove… Dove… d' ye not know:  I may voyage t' th' ends of th' world an' back an' round again, but I've only one home…"  
  
He stops, unwilling to betray more than that.  
  
Their leavetaking is unlike others they've had, the assault still looming large between them, though he's tried hard to help her put it aside.  Instead of deep, passionate kisses that make their heads whirl and shut out everything else, and hands which explore and caress as only lovers can, Barbossa must confine himself to brushing his lips to the backs of the innkeeper's fingers, and soft, chaste pecks to her cheek and the very, very edge of her mouth as he tries his damnedest not to think of how frustrated he is that they should be so close, but cannot, dare not really touch.    
  
He knows how hard he'll use the next whore he purchases in whatever port he ties up in, but somehow, he also knows he'll not be satisfied by it;  never will be, no matter how many women or what services he buys.  It's a certainty that he'll be neither sated nor happy until he can come home again and find himself desired by the innkeeper as much as he desires her.    
  
A distracted captain may be a dead one, but a vexed one makes his crew as miserable as he is and then they may very well wish him dead.  Barbossa will have to be on his guard against that.  
  
"I _will_ come home t' ye,"  he says firmly, before,  "I must go now, but I'd ask ye:  mind what I said 'bout always stayin' in comp'ny, an' keep yerself safe."  
  
"I will."  
  
"Then… until next time, m' darlin'."  
  
This time, it's Barbossa who turns and quickly leaves, that the innkeeper will not see the glint of tears in his eyes or the sadness on his face.  

  
  
-oOo-  TBC  -oOo-


	3. Onslaught of Memory

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Alone without Barbossa's comforting presence for the first time, the innkeeper tries to control her fears; but when suddenly faced with a terrible fright, she must cope with it with only Cora to lean on.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Even modest stress can and often does cause normal bodily functions to go completely awry. Right now, the stress the innkeeper's under is anything but modest, with all sorts of unpleasant results. Missing periods, even several of them, is very common.
> 
> Memory acquired while barely conscious, no matter how deeply buried or repressed it is, is still there and can surface suddenly and in detail, especially when you don't want it to.

 

 

 -oOo-

 

 

 

 

The innkeeper feels like she's sleepwalking, her surroundings familiar, yet shimmering before her eyes, as in a dream;  a terrible dream she can't seem to wake up from.    
  
Cora has scrubbed the kitchen of all reminders of that day;  there's not a ghost of a spot of blood on the floor, the woodwork shines, and all utensils are back in their places save for the roasting spit Barbossa used to skewer the innkeeper's attacker.  That, he took with him, and sank it ten miles out to sea where no one would find it or be able to use it again.  
  
Cora also takes it upon herself to rub down the kitchen's walls and door and table and all other surfaces with salt and sweet herbs;  something she chooses to do on her own, for she does not wish to be reminded of what took place there any more than the innkeeper does.  
  
The gold Barbossa gave the innkeeper comes in handy to pay both her own expenses and Cora's wages, as she won't be reopening the inn for a few weeks, not least until the upset stomach and loose belly that are doing their level best to expel the physical and mental poisons subside;  not until her overall health improves, the bruises fade, and she can move around without the nagging pain of the lacerations between her legs.  
  
Not until she can face welcoming strangers back into her home again.  
  
For awhile, Cora does the cooking for the two of them;  then, hesitantly, the innkeeper joins her.  "It's all right, Missus,"  Cora says quietly.  "Come inside;  I got th' chickens plucked, and I pulled a lemon an' two limes from th' trees.  Thought you might like a dish as reminds you of th' Cap'n."  
  
Cora means only to be kind, but tears come to the innkeeper's eyes as she thinks of how far away he is by now.  "Thank you."  
  
She cleans a lot to pass the time, dusting and scrubbing and washing, unsuccessfully trying to distract herself from the persistent sharp, hot ache in her abdomen where the stranger used his unwelcome organ to bludgeon her hidden female parts.  As most of her other cuts and abrasions heal, the cramping ache becomes more and more pronounced, until despite every effort she makes to try and turn her back on the woozy and heretofore blessedly faint memory, the innkeeper suddenly recalls in all its overpowering ugliness the ghastly moment when her assailant entered her body and tore it open.  It's all there:  everything she's tried to put aside and not think about:  the weight of him as he ground his hips, holding her helplessly down against the floor's hard tiles;  his revolting taste when he mashed his lips and tongue to her mouth, and the way he drooled on her face as he panted;  the sharp pain in her breasts and nipples where he bit her and sucked too hard;  the smell of her own blood as it seeped from her cuts and poured from inside her;  and, oh dear God, those endless dry, blistering strokes that felt like he was forcing a rough iron bar up into her and straight past her navel;  thrust after thrust after burning thrust that just wouldn't _stop_.  She's sure now he must have battered her womb and inflicted other black bruises so deep inside that they were overshadowed by more obvious wounds;  wonders how any man could ravish a woman so long and so hard without spending himself.   Then her nausea doubles and triples as her worst fear of all will no longer be brushed aside:  that amidst all the blood that could have hidden it from Barbossa's examination, she's not certain his seed _didn't_ spill, leaving a child of her defilement to take root in her belly.  
  
Cora come running to find her crying;  not the usual lonely tears that betoken how much she needs Barbossa's sheltering presence, but a howl of panic.  "What is it, Missus?"  she asks, kneeling and taking her hands.  "Please…"  
  
"I…"  The innkeeper gulps.  "I…"  How does she say it without wanting to vomit?  "I didn't think I could be with child, but… now I'm not sure… I almost _am_ sure…"  
  
Cora's eyes widen and she looks sick herself.  "Why d'ye think?"  
  
The innkeeper takes the edge of her smock and tries to wipe the tears and sweat from her face, but it does no good.  "My courses… I've not had them since... since _then_ … and I… I've been sick in the morning…"  
  
"Oh, my Lord,"  Cora whispers.  "Oh my God…!"  
  
The two women cling to each other, the innkeeper sobbing in terror and revulsion, wondering how she can bear one second of thinking she's likely gravid with the spawn of the repulsive man who so violently took her honor, until she sickens beyond any capacity to hold it back and barely makes it to the nearest bucket in time.  
  
The awful ache inside her starts to take on a whole new imagined meaning (although she fails to note things missing that were so unmistakeable in the early stages of being happily pregnant with Barbossa's child:  her breasts, while they still hurt from being savaged, are neither swelling nor tender, and the near-ethereal translucency of her skin isn't there), and the next three days are spent alternately retching and tearing her hair out while she wonders what remedies will remove the parasite from her body, or if she should even bother.  Once it's in there, _if_ it's in there, there's nothing that will make her clean and whole and decent again, and she begins to regard her bedsheets as something other than cloth to cover a mattress.  
  
Before she can do anything untoward to herself, however, the innkeeper wakes from a nightmare-torn sleep to find that her thighs and chemise are stained with the dark, thick blood of her menses, and she realizes that the constant, roiling queasiness was never a symptom of pregnancy, but of understandable fear and disgust.  "Cora!!"  she shrieks.  "Cora…!!"  
  
The maid comes racing from her room, eyes wide and frightened, to find the innkeeper sitting in bed and staring at the blood.  "Oh, Missus…!  Is it…?  Thank God!  Thank God…"  
  
Before she knows it, the innkeeper's clambered to the window, heaving, trailing blood across the floor, but this time, it's not in fright, but a relief so profound that her body's insisting upon purging her stomach of the acidic dread that's been burning holes in it for the last several days.  
  
Cora brings her a cup of mild, sweet wine to rinse out her mouth, a basin of water to wash in, then dresses her in a fresh chemise, changes the sheets on the bed, and wipes the blood off the floorboards.  "Think ye'll be wantin' t' bathe in the morning, eh, Missus?  Some nice warm water to wash everything away should be jus' the trick."  
  
"You're a good girl, Cora,"  the innkeeper sniffles.  "I don't know what I'd do without you.  Go back to bed, now.  I'll be all right."

  
  
-oOo-  
-oOo-

  
  
Though she can't use her tub at the time of her monthlies, the innkeeper much appreciates the two buckets of heated water Cora brings her early the following morning — one to wash with, one for rinsing — to clean away the sweat and anxiety of the night before.  As she smooths the soapy sponge over her body, and washes away the blood that's cleansing her from within, she thinks of Barbossa — his warmth, his growling voice, the gentle kindness he showed her — and hopes he won't fault her for remaining distant awhile longer.  After the relentless bombardment of memory and the unspeakable scare, she needs more time to sort out how she'll feel when he returns and wishes to take her into his arms.  
  
The innkeeper loves Hector Barbossa with all her heart;  that much is certain, and nothing about any of this has or will ever change that.  But she cannot imagine yet what it will feel like to give herself over to him;  to invite him to touch her where she was hurt;  to pleasure him and to once again enjoy being pleasured herself.  
  
Can she still be?  Will she ever?   
  
She doesn't know.

  
  
-oOo-  TBC  -oOo-


	4. Ye Shall Not Ruin Me!

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which a distraught Barbossa is assailed by memories of his own "ruination," but ultimately, has an epiphany.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  _Peran_ is Barbossa's middle name, from the patron saint of Cornwall.
> 
> In the same way that the innkeeper is undergoing a disordering of her physical processes in response to stress following her rape, so is Barbossa as he faces what happened to him: nightmares, a constantly upset stomach, digestive troubles. In his case, the suppression of memory from decades before, only to have it come back at him in such brilliant Technicolor that he can't distinguish it from what's really happening, can be likened to PTSD. The remembered sensations feel very real to him and are both emotionally and physically sickening. 
> 
> Anyone who's ever experience phantom pain — whether in a limb that's no longer there, or from a healed wound — can tell you it's very creepy.

 

 

-oOo-

 

 

 

 

Barbossa's been endlessly crabby, snapping and barking at anyone who dares get in his way, but it's not out of anger or loneliness;  not even the fear that the innkeeper will no longer want him when he returns.  No, this time it's the sight of the table in his cabin that's bringing on shivers, and the tenacious memory of things he wants so much to forget.  
  
He doesn't know what to do to be rid of them once and for all.  
  
Though he's hidden it from the crew, Barbossa's being tortured by vividly bad dreams, often waking with a sharp phantom pain in his backside that leaves him outraged and sick to his stomach.  "Fuck!!"  he growls, spitting into a bucket, then taking a mouthful of rum and spitting again.  "Ye're dead, ye bastards;  fuck off an' don't bother me anymore!  I survived what ye did an' grew t' a fierce man well-loved by a woman;  what th' hell did _you_ do?  Ye died at th' hands of a child what were braver an' more resourceful'n you!"    
  
But it happens again and again, and more than once it leaves Barbossa crushing his pillow against his face so no one will hear him scream as he tenses up against the stretching, pounding pressure he knows isn't really there but his memory and nerves say otherwise and overrule what his conscious brain thinks.  
  
In the dark of his cabin, Barbossa is a child again;  a young boy being abused by his elders — by those bigger and more powerful than he — and why, _why_ did they do it?  It's not like he was pretty of face or of body, nor did he do anything to make them think he'd welcome their advances...... did he?  
  
His adult mind starts to twist the question, asking it as an uncertain boy, taunting him that he must have known no woman would ever want him, and those two men knew it, too;  that nothing happened he didn't desire and ask for......  
  
He stops.  "Have ye lost yer fuckin' wits?"  he berates himself aloud.  "Have ye forgot th' woman as waits for ye, arms held out an' offerin' her sweet body, a-waitin' t' give ye all th' succour ye could possibly want, an' all b'cause ye please her more'n any other?  So you listen here, Hector Peran fuckin'-Barbossa, an' look it square in th' face:  them two bastards took what weren't theirs, an' ye _didn't_ ask for it!"  Barbossa's fists are clenched.  _Ye were but a little boy, outnumbered an' not strong enough t' fight back, an' aye, it were a sickly, loathsome thing, what they done, but it weren't yer fault, no more'n what happened t' m' Dove;  not a bit of it!_         
  
But it's not enough, and the next few nights are spent with the nightmares worse than ever.  With his guts feeling like he's carrying a boulder or two inside them and refusing to function no matter how hard he strains, he actually does begin to bleed;  an ordinary enough thing for men on rough shipboard fare and not nearly enough water, but the timing couldn't be worse.  
  
The blood is the last straw, and Barbossa goes first red, then white with fury.  "Ye'll not touch me like that;  not e'er again!"  he grits out as he drives his knife with both hands into the table, then slumps by his bed, clutching the dirty woollen blanket.  "Not again!  No more!  No goddamn more!"     
  
But this time, once the bleeding lets up, the biliousness passes, and his panic fades, a question occurs.  
  
No, he _wasn't_ pretty, and no, he _didn't_ want it...... and no, he _wasn't_ the first cabin boy assigned to those monsters.  
  
It sets the whole thing out for him at a new angle.    
  
Barbossa tries to calm down and draw clean air into his lungs as he muses,  _An' how many others did ye despoil afore me, eh? How many?_  
  
It's something he never considered before, and it makes him stop and think.  
  
There _were_ others, Barbossa suddenly knows to a certainty, and why did he never realize it?  He's old enough to have learnt that men don't develop those sorts of proclivities out of the blue;  that they'd long been on that same ship, and he was far from the first cabin boy ever to serve them.  That other boys met the same degrading fate at those two officers' hands is as certain as carts to horses.  
  
_Degrading…?_   he thinks all at once.  _Nay, no more'n m' Dove were degraded, nor me, nor th' boys afore me.  Only ones who were degraded were th' ones as hurt us, an' that be th' Lord's truth.  So be gone, foul mem'ry, for I be stronger'n you, an' ye shall not rule nor ruin me!_  
  
It's been what Barbossa was trying to tell the innkeeper, but somehow never truly accepted as applying to himself.  But he knows and accepts it now, and although it will take time to let go of the remembered repugnance at what happened to him, this knowledge starts chipping away at the guilt and shame that have been been simmering below his tough surface for all these years.  
  
The bad dreams and nausea lessen, then thankfully stop, and the pain in his body vanishes;  being more relaxed, his innards finally loosen enough to give him ease;  and, with the passage of time as he stops blaming himself, Barbossa starts to feel like his old, boisterous self again.  "What of it?"  he snaps at the one man foolish enough to enquire if he feels all right now.  "Don't know what th' fuckin' cook put on m' plate, but he damn near poisoned me;  he does it again, an' th' rat'll find hisself heaved overboard."  His blue-eyed glare drills into the crewman.  "An' so'll you for bein' useless if ye don't get m' decks swabbed down, so get yer arse t' work!"  
  
  
  
  
  
-oOo-  TBC  -oOo-


	5. Opening Day

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The innkeeper finally gets up the courage to reopen Grantham House to lodgers. On the very first day, she gets an enormous surprise.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> To say a woman's eyes are flashing green means she's jealous.

 

 

 

-oOo-

 

 

 

 

It's taken awhile, but the innkeeper — if she wants to retain that title — has decided the time has come to open Grantham House again.  She's nervous and keeps putting off her choice of opening day, but finally takes the step when she sees a merchant ship glide into the harbor and sailors in actual uniforms disembark.  Most will be the usual lot, disporting themselves in the roomers and brothels, but the officers might well prefer the quiet comfort her own inn provides.  
  
She sends Cora down the hill to inform a number of locals that if anyone asks, Grantham House is open again;  gets her first lodger even before Cora returns.  "S-sir,"  she stammers to the young lieutenant, unaware that she's anxiously wringing her hands.  "Um… three meals are included in the price of a room;  and, I assure you, I'm the best cook in these islands."  
  
He nods.  "So I hear from our bo'sun, and he'll be up here directly."  
  
_Someone I know?_   "Then perhaps… he's informed you of the one rule of the house?"  
  
"What, no women?"  The young man grins, then signs the ledger.  "Not to be indelicate, Madam, but there are other places to go for that sort of thing.  In the meantime, I'd really rather have some peace and quiet."  
  
The bo'sun, when he arrives, turns out to be an older man the innkeeper has had as a guest several times over the years;  a kind, jolly fellow she's relieved to see, for she knows he will keep her spirits up and her nervousness at bay.  
  
He's also one of those who's aware that Barbossa's her lover, and he gives her a wink.  "Man wi' th' feathers been around lately?"  
  
"Been away for awhile, but he'll be home soon,"  she replies.  _I hope._    
  
After lunch, with both men groaning that they've eaten too much, but how could they possibly help it, the innkeeper gets a rare surprise:  the arrival of a woman, along with her small son.  She's a beautiful woman with light brown hair, her clothes are of a most unusual, though flattering, masculine cut, and she walks with an air of almost-bravado that's familiar to the innkeeper:  a more refined version of Barbossa's swagger.  "Will you accept my coin for a room for me and my little one?"  she asks.  
  
The innkeeper smiles.  "I don't know who's been turning you away, but the only women I don't let in here are… well, they're not like you.  You'll have three meals a day, plus there will be a cot for your son in your room.  Please sign here…"  She watches the woman sign her name:  _Mrs. Elizabeth [William] Turner and Master Henry Turner_.  "Lunch finished awhile ago, but I've plenty more food in the kitchen;  if you'd like, I'll bring you up a tray."  
  
"That would be lovely."  
  
"Follow me, then, Mrs. Turner;  I'll show you to your room."  
  
The chamber the innkeeper chooses is across from her own;  bright and nicely furnished, with a small cot for the boy already there.  "There's cold water in the jug, but if you'd like hot, just let me know and I'll put the kettle on,"  she says.  "The convenience and linen are under the foot of the bed;  and I air the rooms out during the day, so please don't close the windows should you find them open."  
  
"It sounds like home.  I don't think I've closed a window for ages save in a blow."  
  
The innkeeper starts, for that's not a landsman's term for a storm.  "The only people I've ever heard say that were sailors."  
  
"As was I for awhile, though I'd not fault you should you not believe it;  still, it's true."  Elizabeth puts her hand on her son's head and tousles his hair.  "But then I got married and had my little boy, so I've happily gone ashore."  
  
"Ah."  The innkeeper doesn't know what to make of this — like most women, she's been on land all her life — but there's no point in questioning it.  "Tell me:  what would you like to drink?  I've wine and tea, of course, but I also have honeyed lemon water, and juice from the oranges on my own tree."  
  
"How delightful!  The lemon water would be delicious for me, and the orange for Henry.  Our island is rather barren and we don't often get such treats."  
  
The tray prepared, the innkeeper brings Elizabeth a savory stew of meat and onions, a dish of roasted root vegetables, bread and cheese, and the requested drinks.  "Let me know when you're done;  I'll come and collect the tray."     
  
  
  
  
-oOo-  
-oOo-  
  
  
  
  
Not wanting to be a bother, Elizabeth takes her finished lunch tray downstairs, her son at her heels, intending to leave it in the kitchen and go, only to find the innkeeper sitting at the table cleaning a small glass box;  polishing, too, the few small treasures within it.  
  
She's so intent upon her work that she doesn't hear Elizabeth come up behind her just as she's rubbing a cloth over a large, ornately-worked silver button.  "Where did you get that?"  Elizabeth asks, and there's something far more than surprise in her voice.  
  
The innkeeper turns and looks up at her.  "What, this?"  She smiles at the button and caresses it with her fingertips.  "It's… it was given to me by someone… well, by someone.  It fell off his coat, but he wouldn't let me sew it back on when I offered;  bade me keep it instead."  
  
"Why would he do that?  It's a very valuable piece of silver."  
  
"Is it?"  The innkeeper never thought of it that way.  "Perhaps, but it was a gift, and that's where its value lies."  
  
"May I… may I have a closer look?"  
  
Puzzled, the innkeeper lays it gently in Elizabeth's upturned palm, wondering at the look of… recognition?… on her face.  
  
Elizabeth examines it, running her finger over the bumpy raised design and traces of verdigris that are so familiar, her breath coming faster and her hand going to her throat once she gives it back.  "Your 'someone,'"  she says, swallowing,  "wouldn't go by the name of Barbossa, would he?"  
  
All the color drains out of the innkeeper's face.  "You know him, Mrs. Turner?"  
  
"Please, call me Elizabeth, and oh, yes, I do.  You see, Captain Barbossa married me to my husband."  
  
"What?  I… I don't understand…"  
  
There's no reason for Elizabeth to go into detail, but she can explain that she and William Turner had found themselves in a dire situation, and that Barbossa, being a ship's captain and therefore entitled to officiate, had obliged their wish to be married right away.  That it was during a raging storm and under battle conditions, there is no need to add.  "He and my Will have had their quibbles — you know how men are,"  she laughs,  "but in the end, Captain Barbossa was most kind to us."  
  
"So your little boy isn't…"  
  
Elizabeth doesn't know what to make of what she's asking until she sees the flash of green in the innkeeper's eyes.  "Did you think Henry… that he might be the captain's?!  Oh, no, no…!!  I said I knew him, not that there was ever… that we were ever…"  She puts a gentle hand on the innkeeper's shoulder, and her gaze grows solemn.  "Lord, no.  Although I do think he's more to you than just one of your guests or some mere acquaintance.  Is that not so?"  
  
_I want him to come back_ ,  the innkeeper thinks.  _I need him back!_   "He's… he's my…"  _What shall I tell her?_   "He is dear to me."  
  
Elizabeth isn't fooled for a minute;  after chasing halfway around the world to find Will Turner, she knows the look of a woman pining for the man she loves.  "I didn't know,"  she says quietly, sitting down beside the innkeeper and motioning to little Henry to be quiet in his play.  "I didn't know he had someone;  he never said."  
  
That hurts, until it occurs to the innkeeper to ask,  "When was it you last saw him?"  
  
"Oh dear, it's been at least four years, since before Henry was born."  
  
_Ohh, that's why, then:  it's before he came home_ ,  the innkeeper thinks, relieved, as she brushes away a tear with the edge of her apron;  then suddenly, for no reason she can think of, she tells Elizabeth something painful she keeps close to herself;  won't speak about it even to Barbossa.  "We had a little boy, too.  But he died coming into the world and before he could take his first breath."  
  
An astonished Elizabeth takes the innkeeper's hand, trying to imagine the rogue she knows as a father;  attempts to picture her hostess, heavy with his child and radiant with love as she looks up at him, and is surprised to find that it's something she can actually see.  "I'm sorry,"  she tells her.  "I am so, so sorry."  
  
There is naught else she can say, so she sits quietly with the innkeeper for a few moments, silently sharing this grief of a mother as only a woman can.  Of all the things Elizabeth thought she'd encounter on this unaccustomed trip away from her home, this was not one of them:  to discover that the rough man she first met in hatred and anger, then slowly — through wild adventures and in spite of herself — grew rather fond of, has a lover;  that they'd had, and lost, a child.  
  
Finally, she smiles.  "If you should wish to talk, about anything at all, I'm happy to listen.  I'm only here for two days — some nonsense about having to file papers with the authorities if I wish to continue on as keeper of my lighthouse! — but I'd imagine you don't often get female guests or children, and it might be a pleasant change."  
  
Elizabeth will not be telling the innkeeper the circumstances under which she met and sailed with Barbossa, any more than he ever would, but she can see that this woman is so lonely;  that, she can certainly understand, and has more than enough empathy to spare.  
  
For the innkeeper's part, she wants so much to talk about her Hector:  the man she coldly sent away (or so she thinks) and is beginning to wonder if he'll ever return.  She doesn't want to think or speak about what happened to her and _why_ he's gone, but she can confess her increasing loneliness for him and her desire that he come home.  To this woman — this beautiful Elizabeth who knew him during the many years he was lost to her, but who was, thank the Lord, never his lover — she can speak of the ordinary things that she and Barbossa share.  
  
The innkeeper hopes that talking about such things will aid in bringing back all the feelings she had before, without unease, without ill memory intruding.  It's what she longs for more with each passing day.  
  
When Elizabeth and little Henry depart in the early morning two days later, it's with a market basket packed with her best food such as the innkeeper's always given Barbossa on his leaving days.  "Please remember me,"  she says as she hands it over.  "And you're always welcome here, for any reason or no reason at all.  Perhaps Hec… perhaps the Captain would like to see you."  
  
And that's why Elizabeth knows she will never come back:  because Barbossa last saw her on the high seas as the brash Pirate King with a sword in her hand, but this is a deeply personal, much gentler part of his world where she doesn't belong.  Even so,  "Perhaps one day,"  she answers softly, kissing the innkeeper's cheek in farewell.  "Thank you for the food and the fruit;  Henry and I will think of you as we enjoy it."  
  
The innkeeper sits at the dining room table once Elizabeth's gone, turning Barbossa's silver button in her fingers, awash in a warm feeling that she hasn't allowed to herself for the past several months.  For so long now, the idea of her beloved's touch upon her was something she was afraid she'd never want again, but something's changed over time;  changed slowly, but changed, it has.  It's as if she feels all the broken pieces of herself trying to fuse themselves back together, and now, she needs just one last thing to make her whole:   for Barbossa to hold her;  to murmur that she's still and always has been his Dove and he cannot live without her, and that nothing will ever alter her in his eyes.  
  
The innkeeper knows what a raging terror Barbossa is to the world, but also that she, alone, can soften him:  his words, his smile, the way he takes her to him, the touch of his lips and hands.  In his care for her healing, she's confident that his lovemaking will be gentle;  knows that, with their first joining, he must not and will not be rough no matter how much such aggressiveness might mutually please them later on.    
  
She knows too well what a mortifying hurt was done to her and that as long as she remains alone with the memory, allowing it to take her over and inhabit her dreams, she cannot completely heal.  Now she needs her Hector to come back to her and into her, whispering his lover's entreaties, polishing her clean with his roaming hands and hard flesh pressed into her most hidden places;  washing and purifying her with touch and tongue and seed.  Only then will she know she's come back and belongs solely to him;  that nothing has ever or will ever come between them again.  
  
"Ohhh, Hector,"  she sighs.  "Come home.  Please come home.    
  
"It's time."  
  
  
  
      
  
-oOo-  TBC  -oOo-


	6. Homecoming:  Ne'er Again Let Me Go

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> After eight months away to allow the innkeeper to sort out her uneasy feelings about once again being with a man — and after dealing with some very unpleasant memories himself — Barbossa finally returns home. But what kind of reception will he receive?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There's a closer examination of the always-set place at the head of the table in _The Man of the House_.

 

 

 

-oOo-

 

 

 

  
  
The spyglass to his eye, Barbossa watches Grantham House come closer and closer, glad to be home, but fearful of what he might find when he gets there.  Has the innkeeper forgotten him?  Has she _wanted_ to forget him?  Their diffident leavetaking gave him no clue of what he might expect upon his return.  
  
To find that he's no longer welcome would be devastating.  
  
Though he's usually crisp with his orders and first into the cockboats, Barbossa dawdles and hangs back this time, sitting in his cabin and looking at the pencil portrait he long ago drew of the innkeeper and keeps by his bed.  He has a modest artistic talent, and it's recognizable enough:  the oval face and dark eyes, the long spill of wavy black hair, the straight nose and faint smile.  Her curving shoulders and the swell of her soft, ample bosom are there, too, and Barbossa touches them with dirty fingertips.  
  
_I want a bath_ ,  he thinks as he regards the ground-in grime on his hands and thinks of how dirty he is everywhere else.  _I want a bath, an' I want ye t' bathe me with yer soft touch, m' darlin'.  An' after, I want th' taste of yer mouth afore ye take me int' yer bed, an' yer smile of delight as I join m'self to ye.  But more'n anythin', I want not t' feel that yer body's still pained nor t' see fright in yer eyes_ … — Barbossa catches his breath —  … _for I could not bear it;  not after all this time_.  
  
_What shall I find when I come home?_  
  
He waits for an hour, then two, and nearly 'til sundown, locked in his cabin and anxiously pacing.  "Aye, right, I'm comin', don't bloody well shout!"  he finally replies to the voice that enquires if he wishes to board the next cockboat going ashore.    
  
  
  
  
-oOo-  
-oOo-  
  
  
  
  
Barbossa straightens his coat and hat, then knocks sharply on the inn's front door, although he chooses to wait for it to be answered instead of going right in as he usually does.  
  
He has to rap again, and it's Cora who opens the door, an irritated look on her face.  "Cap'n?"  she says, surprised.  "You shoulda just come in."  
  
"Since when are ye takin' issue wi' me tryin' t' be polite?"  
  
She shrugs and steps aside.  "It's suppertime, an' the Missus is servin'."  
  
"Well, why aren't _you_ , wench, so she can sit down an' eat?"  
  
With that curt question, Cora knows life is back to normal;  she huffs at him, but says nothing more.  
  
Barbossa takes his hat off;  flings it so it lands on one of the big wooden hooks on the wall;  slowly makes his way to the dining room that sits off the kitchen.  "Dove,"  is all he says as the innkeeper comes out with a plate of thickly-sliced bread.  
  
It lands on the floor when she sees him, the plate broken and the bread scattered.  "Hector!  Oh, Hector…!  I saw the _Pearl_ come in, but when you didn't get here, I was afraid something might have happened…"  
  
He's not going to admit to his own fear that his welcome would be less than he wanted, so all he says is,  "There were things as had t' be seen to aboard ship that took more time than I thought, so I've just come ashore."  
  
The three lodgers seated are watching the exchange with interest, and never more so than when the innkeeper nods to the head of the table and smiles at Barbossa, saying,  "Sit.  Your place is all set."  _So that's who the place is for!_  
  
Heedless of the three pairs of eyes and ears watching and listening to every word, Barbossa gestures to the chair across from him.  "An' you, m' darlin':  sit yerself down as well.  Let Cora clean up th' broken crockery an' bring in more bread."  
  
The innkeeper nods, but before she sits, she pours him wine, her hand gliding over his as he lifts the goblet.  "Welcome home, Hector,"  she whispers, her lips brushing against his greasy hair and the length of worn blue linen that binds it, oblivious to how dirty he is.  "I've missed you more than you'll ever know."  
  
Barbossa's voice is unsteady as he answers,  "An' you, Dove.  An' you."  
  
He digs into one of the best meals he's ever had in his life, not least because the innkeeper is smiling at him with no trace of the rattled tension he last saw.  "Ahh, shut yer trap!"  he says jovially to a lodger who knows of his reputation and ventures to ask if he's going legitimate by owning an inn.  "Grantham House bain't mine — though its proprietress is! — an' all th' comforts y' enjoy here be thanks t' her."  Barbossa raises his goblet to the innkeeper, who blushes.  "T' th' cook for this fine meal, an' th' landlady for all her labor in givin' us comfort an' makin' us welcome, an' that she's both deserves naught but our admiration."  
  
Three more tankards and goblets are raised with a resounding,  "T' cook an' landlady!"  
  
His supper finished, Barbossa asks for some water to wash in.  There's no time for a full bath unless he wishes to put the innkeeper and Cora through the backbreaking trouble of hauling a dozen buckets of water in the dark and then heating them up, but he nonetheless wishes to clean the worst of the grime off his skin while they're occupied in the kitchen.  
  
Cora fetches him two buckets of water and a sponge — there's already a slice of castile on the washstand — and then stands there tapping her foot.  "Out with ye!"  Barbossa orders, for he knows what she's waiting for.  "I bain't in th' habit of strippin' off in front of just anyone!"  
  
"Too bad,"  she says with a grin before she leaves.  
  
The innkeeper has added a kettleful of boiled rainwater to take the chill off, and after removing his clothing, Barbossa dips the sponge and draws it across the soap, gives it a squeeze to work up some suds, and begins to wash his face and hands and everything else that's either dirtiest or most intimate.  There's been many a time he's bedded a whore with a prick that hadn't seen a proper wash in a season, but that will not be the case here.  "I won't ask her t'night or th' next, old son,"  he says to his cock as he gives it a pat, then gently scrubs it, along with the family jewels, and lathers their adornment of curling auburn hair,  "but she'll give ye a nice wet suck when she's ready, so jus' be patient.  Meantime, ye're still in for a treat."  
  
No sooner does Barbossa manage to transform himself from filthy to merely somewhat grubby, than the innkeeper comes up and enters the room as he's wrapping himself up in a sheet.  "Hector,"  she says softly.  
  
"Dove."  She's still shy of him, he can see, but the fearful hesitance appears to be gone.  "Come, darlin', ye know I won't hurt ye."  
  
She approaches him and touches his scarred shoulder;  puts her hand on his chest, then sighs when he takes it between both of his own and gives it a kiss.  "I wasn't sure you'd come back.  I was so… I was afraid you were angry."  
  
Her words make Barbossa's heart twist.  "Oh, m' darlin' girl, don't be foolish;  I ne'er been angry wi' you a day in m' life."  He draws closer, slipping a hand around her waist in a gentle tug.  "God, I've missed ye, sweet.  Missed ev'rythin' about ye:  yer soft skin an' hair, yer scent, th' sound of yer voice…"  
  
_I've 'specially missed th' way ye hold me like I's th' only man in th' whole goddamn world what could e'er be worth anythin' to ye._  
  
He pushes her cap off and strokes his fingers through her hair, wishing he'd managed to wash more of the dirt off his body, but knowing she appreciates the effort he made all the same.  Then slowly, so slowly, Barbossa puts his hands against the innkeeper's face, and bows his head to kiss her.  But just before his lips touch hers, he stops, thinks better of it, pulls back a bit, and whispers,  "Shall ye desire this, Dove?  Shall ye desire _me_?"  His thumb glides over her cheek.  "Ye must tell me, not what ye think I wish t' hear, but what ye truly feel.  If…"  He swallows, for what he's about to say comes unbearably hard and is not at all what he wants, but if he's ever cared for this woman, then there's a terrible choice he must allow her to make.  "I feel how ye're tremblin', an' if ye're still so afeared of m' touch that ye'd wish me away, then say so an' I'll… I'll go.  In time, jus' once more, I'll come back, an' p'raps things 'twixt us'll be better.  But if 'tis more'n that… if th' truth be that ye do not want me any longer an' ne'er will, then by God, say it plain so I may take m'self from yer presence right now an' be rid of knowin' such torment.  If yer care for me be gone, then I'll keep yer sweet mem'ry wi' me always, for not even you can take that away, but… I do swear I'll walk away an' ye need ne'er see me again."  
  
_Please don't let her tell me she wants it so_ ,  he thinks in dread, and,  _How should I make such a foolish promise as I know I cannot keep?_  
  
It's taken months for the innkeeper to think of holding Barbossa once more — to think of tasting his lips and lying beneath him, inviting him to touch and caress and become one with her — but her wounds healed long ago, and with both time and a separation she was afraid might last forever, her fear of making love with him has dwindled and vanished, and need has taken its place.  "Don't you dare leave me, Hector!"  she cries, her grip on him tightening.  "Don't say it;  don't even think it!  If I'm trembling, it's only because I'm so very glad to have you near.  None of this was ever about not wanting you… only… only…"  
  
"Shhh, ye needn't explain."  Barbossa could weep in relief, although he obstinately doesn't show it, saying only,  "I just wanted t' know I ain't lost ye;  that ye're still m' very own Dove as wishes t' hold me close;  that ye'll ne'er again push me away;  ne'er again let me go……"  
  
He does kiss her, then;  their first real kiss since that dreadful afternoon, warm and wet and full of the passion denied them for so long.  "Shall ye desire this, Dove?"  he asks again, and now it is he through whose body the tremor passes.  "D' ye desire me as much as I desire you?  Tell me 'tis so, sweet;  I ache for ye an' can bear it no longer."  
  
The innkeeper is as breathless as she was the night that Barbossa first came back to her, wanting only to reclaim her right to lie with the man she loves and feel nothing but pleasure.  "You're a fool, Hector, if you think I'd feel anything else."  Her fingers tickle up and down his bare spine, coming to rest against his slender hips, urging him to press as close as he can as she maneuvers him sideways to the bed.  "Now stop talking — _please_ stop talking! — and hold me.  Ohhh, Hector, please…"  Her sigh as Barbossa's hand slips gently over her breast is the sound he'd hoped for:  one of inviting excitement.  "Just hold me…"

 

  
  
-oOo-  FIN  -oOo-


End file.
